Gift Bracelet

One of the Christmas gifts I gave this year was this handmade charm bracelet:

I made this for Andrew’s stepmother Clare.  She is a devout Catholic, and I when I saw this pretty vintage cross charm on eBay, I just knew that I had to make something with it for Clare. Here’s the back of the charm:

It says, "I am a Catholic.  Please call a priest."  Isn’t that a perfect gift?

Merry Christmas!

Okay – I know it’s a day late, but as you can see, I haven’t really had time to post lately.  I’ve been so caught up in the holiday craziness, I just haven’t had a chance.

So let me see if I can catch you up just a bit…

Emily and Matt had their school Christmas concert – here we are getting ready (Andrew went kicking and screaming – I reminded him how many of HIS concerts Matt and Emily have attended over the years…):

Then Emily had her dance recital – she’s been taking a hip-hop dance class for the last few months.  The routine was ADORABLE, but for some reason, photos on the stage don’t come out so well.  But here she is with her flowers after the performance:

Andrew also had a Christmas play for his school.  He was mainly a background character, but was on stage during the entire play.

I managed to capture a photo of the entire school (yes – the whole school, not just the class) on stage for the finale at the Broadway Theater:

Andrew is in the middle right section – see him? 😉

We also went camping last weekend.  We were lucky enough to have several inches of snow on the ground – the kids (and dogs) had fun playing in it (good thing because the indoor pool was closed for maintenance!):

That last photo is Matt trying to chip the ice and snow off the tablecloth on our picnic table.  After we managed to pry the frozen tablecloth from the table, we had to throw it away (it had several large holes).

While we were there, Mike and his brother Mark built a temporary mud room for the camper.  We’ll use it to store our winter gear and cut down on the cold wind at our door.

Isn’t it lovely?  Now, before you criticize the aesthetics of OUR pretty room, let me show you a few others from around the campground:

As you can see, we’re right in style with our beautiful plywood lean-to!  We’re hoping to take it down at the end of the season and use it again next year.

Our last day at the campground, the weather started to turn, so we headed back home just in time for Christmas Eve.

Christmas Eve was a hectic day – it involved FOUR trips to Target – don’t even get me started!  Let’s just say that next year, *I* will be in charge of all of the Christmas shopping!

But after a crazy day of last-minute errands and baking DOZENS of cookies, we took some time to celebrate the real meaning of Christmas during our Christmas Eve worship service.  It was a beautiful and moving service – the first one in our new church building. And to make it even more wonderful, Emily played ‘Away in a Manger’ with our children’s bell choir.

After the service, we visited another local Christmas tradition – the Haggerty’s light display.  Every year, a local family puts up thousands of lights and hundreds of animated characters to share with our community.  Here are Matt and Emily:

All of the kids absolutely love the Christmas display – thanks to the Haggerty family!

And a belated Merry Christmas to all of you from the Torrence family!